


Doors

by koalathebear



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2012-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-28 15:57:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/309549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/koalathebear/pseuds/koalathebear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Up to and including episode 213 Critical Mass.  For anyone who doesn't know who Novak is, she's the engineer on the Daedalus who works with Hermiod the Asgard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Doors

Dr Lindsay Novak shifts nervously as she eyes the elegant, poised woman before her. She wonders if Doctor Elizabeth Weir ever looks anything but immaculate. Probably not. She has never seen the woman with a hair out of place. Her make-up is flawless, her demeanour calm and unruffled. Novak on the other hand is a bundle of nerves. She knows why she's here and the fact that she's innocent doesn't make her feel any less jumpy.

"You understand that I am interviewing everybody on board the ship?"

Novak nods, swallowing hard. "Oh, sure, I know. I mean, whoever planted the bomb was probably eager to get away from the city!" She chuckles nervously as she realises what she has just said. Her face is sheepish. "N-not that I was eager. I was just doing my job. I couldn't have cared less when we left ... but ... I care about my job, I just didn't ... " She trails off nervously, coughing and then gives up. "You were saying?"

Weir smiles at her with a gentle expression in her eyes. It's clear she's only interviewing Novak because she's interviewing everyone onboard the Daedalus.

"Doctor, you have nothing to be nervous about here," Elizabeth tells her.

Novak laughs. "I know, I know ... unless, of course, I was guilty, then I would have some... " She hiccoughs and then apologises.

"Have you noticed any crewmembers' .... change in behaviour the last few weeks? I don't know – anybody acting in a suspicious or odd manner?"

Novak shakes her head but then says. "No ... Wait," she pauses for a moment then says,"I-I-I-I mean, no". She hiccoughs and then exclaims in exasperation,"Oh, for God's sake!"

"Can I get you some water?" Elizabeth asks with genuine sympathy.

"Uh, no, wouldn't do any good. I get the hiccoughs when I'm nervous – it goes _way_ beyond annoying," she says confidingly. She takes a deep breath. "But wait ...," she thinks for a moment. "The pony-tailed guy, Doctor Kavanagh? He was always hanging around, looking over your shoulder, poking through computers. Kinda creepy," at Elizabeth's expression she hesitates and says nervously. "Well, not really, uh ... creepy as much as, um, peculiar, maybe, uh ... I-I-I-I don't know the guy, he could be a great person. I mean, who am I to judge, you know?," she hiccoughs again and then says in resignation. "I'll just shut up".

Dr McKay's voice comes over Elizabeth's headset. "Elizabeth".

Weir glances at Novak. "Excuse me," she says as she activates her headset. "Yes, Rodney?"

"Can you come to the Control Room? I've discovered something important".

"I'm on my way," she tells him. She glances at Novak. "If you'll excuse me?" she says to her as she stands.

"Yes, sir. Uh, ma'am," Novak says awkwardly and then watches as Elizabeth leaves the room.

Novak glances around wondering if she's supposed to wait or if she can go. She sighs. She wishes that she'd had the sense to ask.

***

"Split up, I'll take the level down. You two go and sweep the third level again," Lorne tells his men. No one says it, but they're all thinking it. Looking for a bomb hidden in Atlantis is worse than looking for a needle in a haystack. They keep looking, though, because they have no choice.

As Lorne turns to leave, he pauses as he hears a familiar voice and an even more familiar sound.

There's a loud hiccough followed by an exasperated voice. "Come on, Lindsay. Pull yourself together. It's just a _door_!"

Lorne's mouth twitches as he follows the sound of the voice - and the hiccoughs which are increasing in strength and volume.

"Concentrate .... now think....what would Hermiod do?" she mutters to herself.

Lorne turns the corner and watches as Doctor Lindsay Novak is talking to herself and a door. She waves her hand before the panel, scowling and swearing as there is no reaction and the door remains stubbornly uncooperative.

"Oh for the love of god," she exclaims, waving her hand before the panel again and looking as if she's about to implode. Her dark blonde hair is starting to escape from her pony tail and fly about her head in slightly demented wisps as her flushed face glowers angrily at the panel.

Lorne decides it's time to intervene. "Can I help you with anything, Dr Novak?"

Novak spins around, her fair skin pink with embarrassment and frustration. "Major Lorne! Were you being interrogated, too?" she demands and Lorne's brows lift swiftly.

"Dr Weir was questioning you about the bomb?" he demands in disbelief. He's aware that the crew of the Daedalus are being questioned in connection with the bomb, but it hadn't occurred to him that even Dr Lindsay Novak would fall under suspicion. The idea is more than a little preposterous.

"Well ... you know ... engineer and all .... multiple degrees. Technically a ... a... genius even," she says with a laugh and then hiccoughs self-consciously as she realises what she's just said. "Imagine though, thinking that _I_ might want to plant a bomb .... Hermiod's offended that no one's bothering to question him," she tells Lorne who smiles at her.

"Anything I can help you with?" he asks her, indicating the door.

"It won't open! I don't understand, I have the ATA Gene, I've undergone the gene therapy and ...well ... it seemed to work .. at least I thought ..."

"Dr Novak," Lorne says gently.

"I tried waving my hand in front of the control panel, I mean it wasn't an easy decision to have the gene therapy. There's something very disturbing about the thought of introducing foreign genetic material into my body ... it's ... it's ... it's just too risky, but I thought well ... I guess I should just do it, it makes sense right? After all I'm on the Daedalus so I ..."

"Dr Novak," Lorne repeats again, this time slightly more loudly.

"I guess it's kind of funny, like I said. I'm an engineer, a suspect for planting a bomb and I can't even get an Ancient door to open for me," she waves her hand in front of the panel again. She hiccoughs loudly and covers her mouth. "Here I've gone and changed the expression of my genes - god knows to what effect and still this door won't open!" She loses the remnants of her composure and kicks the door defiantly.

"You show that door who's boss," Lorne says with amusement as Novak gives him a withering look.

"Oh and I suppose you'll just come and wave your hand in front of it and it will open. Clearly your gene therapy worked while mine didn't," she says, her large, gentle eyes uncharacteristically stormy.

Lorne walks up to her and grips her by the shoulders, grinning again as she hiccoughs. "Take a deep breath, Dr Novak. This door is faulty, it's broken. We've locked it with a conventional earth lock. It doesn't open without a key," he says. She stares at him in consternation and feels very foolish. Strands of hair fall into her eyes and she makes a vain attempt to blow them away.

Lorne wants to laugh but instead he reaches out and brushes the hair off her face. Her huge eyes are wide and startled.

"If you really want go in there, I'll open it for you," he tells her. "But to be honest, it's just a storeroom and not very exciting". His hands are warm and reassuring as they rest on her shoulders.

"Now breathe," he tells her.

"Breathe?" she demands in astonishment.

"You're still kind of .... hyperventilating," he says with a very gentle smile. She's as nutty and manic in her own way as McKay but for some reason while it's kind of annoying in McKay, in Novak it's wildly adorable.

Her eyes look around wildly as she stands rigidly. Finally she gives an 'oh well' gesture and makes an attempt at regulating her breathing.

Lorne laughs. "It's easy ... now relax..... just breathe with me ok?" She nods. "Inhale .... exhale ...." he says, demonstrating and she tries to comply except that her breaths are much shallower than his. His closeness disconcerts her, as does the very warm and admiring expression in his eyes. At the end of the first exhale, she gives an inevitable hiccough.

Lorne hears Weir's voice over his headset. "Major Lorne, we've discovered that there is no explosive device. Someone has rewritten Atlantis' operating system and disabled the failsafes - right now we're trying to find out the person who did it so that we can get the access codes. You can call off your search".

"Yes ma'am," he says politely.

Novak stands there listening as he gives orders to his men to stop the search. She watches the gentle humour vanish from his face as he speaks seriously and with quiet but very self-assured authority.

When he finishes, he looks back at her and the warmth returns to his eyes. Lorne finds it impossibly endearing that Dr Lindsay Novak been bested by a humble door. He has watched the brilliant engineer handle the Asgard transporter and hyperdrive engine of the Daedalus with effortless ease. He has watched her perform her duties with cool professionalism and efficiency in a combat situation and he has admired her calmness and sharp intelligence in stressful and dangerous situations.

The hiccoughing, child-like Lindsay Novak with her coltish awkwardness and huge, wary eyes is not a child and even though he could probably have his pick of the women at Atlantis, Lorne has found his gaze and his thoughts returning time and time again to the brilliant engineer with the hiccoughing problem.

He knows Sheppard has noticed. It's no coincidence that when Lindsay Novak is occasionally sent offworld to assist with maintenance or repairwork or to conduct research that Lorne is assigned guard her. He still remembers Sheppard's smirk as he says,"I'll give you a choice today - you going to babysit McKay or Dr Novak? Probably the latter given your recent, somewhat inexplicable fascination with Asgard technology". The smirk and the comment refer to the intensity with which Lorne found himself listening to a monologue about the inner workings of the control panel that Hermiod operated.

He hadn't been feigning interest. Novak had spoken with such animation and enthusiasm, her awkwardness and shyness forgotten that it had been hard not to be drawn in.

"I'd better head back," Novak says abruptly, aware that she and Lorne have been standing there staring at one another for a disconcertingly long time. Somewhere along the way, they've managed to close the distance between them and they're standing very close to one another.

"I'll walk back with you," he offers. Novak doesn't conceal her surprise. "I'll show you many doors that _will_ open for you and if they won't open for you, I'll open them for you," he promises her. "How's that for an offer?"

They walk down the corridor side by side. Novak looks up into the smiling eyes of Major Lorne. Her hiccoughs are forgotten as she finds herself laughing at something he is saying.

"Never say we don't show you guys a good time when you come to visit," he tells her.

The tension leaves her. The Ancient door might have been closed to her, but this doorway has certainly opened the way for all number of interesting possibilities.

  
**The End**   



End file.
